It’s that time of the year. Seniors are wearing goggles and floaties all around town and on their way to school while carrying around water guns. That’s because it’s officially time for Senior Assassin. This game is only open to seniors and the objective is to be the last person left in the game to win a cash prize.
In the game, everyone playing must download the Splashin App, and each player gets assigned a target. All official rules can be seen on the Timberlane Senior Splashin instagram account @trhs_senior_assassin_2026. In order to get your target out, you must record yourself spraying them with a water gun. However, your target can wear swim goggles or floaties to grant themselves immunity, meaning they can’t be eliminated. In order for immunity to be granted, the goggles must be worn and visible on the head of the player, or at least one floaty must be inflated, on, and visible.
For the first round, each assassin has 14 days to spray their target. To move onto the next round, the player’s target must be eliminated and each player can’t let their assassin eliminate them. There are also rules for when people can get their target out. During the school day from 7:15am-2:15pm, no one can get out on school grounds. This is so that no classes are interrupted. Players also have immunity when they are working. If anyone breaks these rules and records themselves getting their targets out during these safe times, a bounty may be placed on them. This means that for a certain amount of time, anyone can get this person out.
To add a twist to the game, there are purge days. On these purge days, nobody may be granted immunity by floaties or goggles. Assassins can also get out any player they want, even if they aren’t their assigned target. Once a player eliminates someone on purge day, they are safe for the remainder of the day. Purge days are a great way to eliminate more people, but it is risky as anyone can also eliminate you.
Some players just play for fun, while others take it very seriously. It seems like most people’s defensive strategy is to just wear goggles at all times when not at school. Senior Ashlee Salafia stated, “My strat was to wear goggles at all times because you never know when the ops are coming. I lasted two weeks and was bribed to get out cause it got really boring and annoying.” Salafia was offered $20 by another player to be eliminated on the last purge day, Saturday, April 18.
Another player, Charlotte Beaudoin, expressed that she had a good time playing even though she didn’t last very long. Beadoin said, “I lasted until the first purge day so only a week… Overall I had fun wearing the goggles and trying to find out who had who with my friends.” She was eliminated by Aladin Crnolic when trying to leave her house and was very upset at first, but she “got over it in about an hour.” Beaudoin’s elimination involved a few minute run as she tried to escape Crnolic, but eventually she got caught. Her, along with all of the other eliminations can be seen on the Timberlane Senior Splashin instagram page.
When setting up a Senior Assassin game, one person needs to be in charge of collecting the money, managing instagram, controlling the app, and approving “kills.” This year at Timberlane, that person is Julia Johnson. When asked how she got the role Johnson stated, “I ended up running senior assassin because I heard that many of the seniors wanted to participate and I also had a few people ask me to run it!” Johnson explained that each player paid $5 to enter, and with 90 players that makes the cash pot $450. First place will be awarded 80% of that, second place will receive 15%, and third place will get the remaining 5% of the money.
According to Johnson, there were 60 eliminations in the first round, which lasted 14 days. She believes that, “people really took advantage of the purge days, which is when there is no immunity from goggles/floaties and anyone can get anyone.” Round two officially began on Monday, April 20, meaning that the players still in the game were assigned their new targets.
Senior Assassin has been around for decades and has continued to evolve into the game that it is today. It started spreading across the country more rapidly in the early 1980s as formalized rules were put in place by the release of “Killer: The Game of Assassination.” As social media grew, the game became more popular as eliminations and stories were being shared online. The version of the game is now surrounded by the Splashin App which was created in 2025. Splashin has its own rules, but schools may also add to the rules.
At Timberlane, the game will end when one person remains, so there is no exact end date. Last year there were multiple winners including Liam Kelley and Ella Ring. No teachers or staff have to worry about the game interfering with academics as rules clearly state immunity during the school day.
